“Lemur’s Jump Over Gorge Clinches Victory in 2025 BigPicture Natural World Contest”
“Leap of Faith” by Zhou Donglin. Grand Prize Winner.
“Lemurs are incredibly agile beings. With elongated tails ensuring balance and robust, slender limbs equipped with opposable thumbs and toes, they navigate the jagged limestone towers of western Madagascar’s Tsingy de Bemaraha National Park with grace. Nevertheless, jumping over a 30-meter (100-foot) gorge while carrying a baby on your back seems like a bold decision.
To immortalize this moment, photographer Zhou Donglin had to engage in some mountaineering herself. Departing before dawn, Donglin dedicated an hour to climbing to the summit of a rocky elevation, hoping the elusive brown lemurs (Eulemur fulvus) would make an appearance. After a day filled with frustratingly distant observations, Donglin finally encountered some luck as a small group descended through a stony forest, illuminated in golden hues during the late evening light.”
A daring lemur setting out in pursuit of food earned Zhou Donglin the top accolade in the 2025 BigPicture Photography Competition. Captured in Madagascar at the conclusion of the dry season, the intrepid lemur brings her baby along, leaping across a chasm to guarantee her infant is nourished. Such images epitomize the competition, now celebrating its 12th year.
Managed by the California Academy of Sciences and led by wildlife photographer Suzi Eszterhas, the award-winning photographs depict rare glimpses of the natural world. Whether it’s Donglin scaling a rocky summit to photograph the lemur or Kat Zhou revisiting a diving location before witnessing a female octopus sacrificing her life for her progeny, each photographer is prepared to make sacrifices to achieve the image they seek.
Photographer Amit Eshel, victor of the Terrestrial Wildlife category, also understands the notion of sacrifice. It took him two years to observe Arctic wolves in the secluded regions of Canada, but his perseverance paid off when he eventually encountered a pack on a frozen fjord. “I laid down holding my camera with a wide lens and they came over for a very close look,” he remarks. “At times they were so near they almost touched me, and I could smell their breath.”
Scroll down to view all of the winners and selected finalists.
Here are the remarkable winners of the 2025 BigPicture Photography Competition.
“My Octopus Mother” by Kat Zhou. Aquatic Life Winner.
“Photographer Kat Zhou was diving off the coast of Florida when friends notified her about this female octopus and her eggs nestled in some kind of pipe, possibly a remnant of a shipwreck. Zhou returned four times, attempting to capture the mother’s resolve to safeguard her young in their most vulnerable state. She aspires for her work to evoke empathy for marine life, including an animal whose behaviors vastly differ from our own but whose maternal instincts remain entirely relatable.
The Caribbean reef octopus (Octopus briareus) depicted here broods several hundred sizable eggs. Once she lays her eggs, the female ceases to eat and vigilantly guards her growing offspring around the clock. Her little ones will emerge as fully formed, miniature replicas of their parents, ready to change colors, squirt ink, hunt for sustenance, and thrive as small but complete octopuses in the shallow waters of the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico. In contrast, having exhausted herself to ensure her young’s survival, their mother will pass away shortly after they hatch.”
“Part of the Pack” by Amit Eshel. Terrestrial Wildlife Winner.
“Reaching Ellesmere Island, located in Canada’s extreme north, is an adventure in itself. It required six domestic flights for Israeli photographer Amit Eshel to get within reach, followed by days of travel via dogsled and snowmobile to arrive at the northern part of the island. Eshel embarked on the journey hoping to spot Ellesmere’s wolves, which have no known history of being hunted and are unafraid of the few human visitors they meet. However, only about 200 Arctic wolves (Canis lupus arctos) inhabit Ellesmere, roughly the size of Great Britain, and during Eshel’s initial visit in April 2022, he and his Inuit guides searched for two weeks without encountering them.
He attempted again in 2024. This time, 12 days into the expedition, his team was traversing a frozen fjord in -35 degrees Celsius (-31 Fahrenheit) temperatures when they caught sight of a single wolf through binoculars. Eight more quickly appeared, and the pack leisurely approached Eshel.”
“Tiny Tent Makers” by Dvir Barkay. Winged Life Winner.
“Bats are typically not recognized for their adorability. However, the Honduran white bat (Ectophylla alba) is no ordinary bat. One of the tiniest fruit-eating bats globally, it’s approximately the size of a golf ball and the weight